now planned a scheme of universal knowledge, to impart which a series of works would have to be written, far exceeding what the resources and industry of one man, however great a scholar, could produce. He therefore looked about for a patron to supply money for his support, and that of his assistants, whilst these works were in progress. The vastness of the labours I contemplate,' he writes to a Polish nobleman, demands that I should have a wealthy patron, whether we look at their extent, or at the necessity of securing assistants, or at the expenses generally.'

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At Leszno there seemed no prospect of his obtaining the aid he required; but, his fame now procured him invitations from distant countries. First he received a call to improve the schools of Sweden. After declining this, he was induced by his English friends to undertake a journey to London, where Parliament had shown its interest in the matter of education, and had employed Hartlib, an enthusiastic admirer of Comenius, to attempt some reforms. Hartlib procured an order summoning Comenius, who gives the following account of his journey :-

"When seriously proposing to abandon the thorny studies of Didactics, and pass on to the pleasing studies of philosophical truth, I find myself again among the same thorns. After the Pansophiæ Prodromus had been published and dispersed through various kingdoms of Europe, many of the learned approved of the object and plan of the work, but despaired of its ever being accomplished by one man alone, and therefore advised that a college of learned

men should be instituted to carry it into effect. Mr. S. Hartlib, who had forwarded the publication of the Pansophia Prodromus in England, laboured earnestly in this matter, and endeavoured, by every possible means, to bring together for this purpose a number of men of intellectual activity. And at length, having found one or two, he invited me also, with many very strong entreaties. As my friends consented to my departure, I proceeded to London, and arrived there on the day of the autumnal equinox, 1641, and I then learned that I had been called thither by an order of Parliament. But in consequence of the King's having gone to Scotland, the Parliament had been dismissed for three months, and consequently I had to winter in London, my friends in the meantime examining the "Apparatus Philosophicus," small though it was at that time. . . . At length Parliament having assembled, and my presence being known, I was commanded to wait until after some important business having been transacted, a Commission should be issued to certain wise and learned men, from amongst themselves, to hear me, and be informed of my plan. As an earnest, moreover, of their intentions, they communicated to me their purpose to assign to us a college with revenues, whence some men of learning and industry, selected from any nation, might be honourably sustained, either for a certain number of years, or in perpetuity. The Savoy in London, and beyond London, Winchester, and again near the city, Chelsea, were severally mentioned, and inventories of the latter, and of its revenues,

were communicated to me. So that nothing seemed more certain than that the design of the great Verulam to open a Universal College of all nations, devoted solely to the advancement of the sciences was now in the way of being carried into effect. But a rumour that Ireland was in a state of commotion, and that more than 200,000 of the English there had been slaughtered in one night, the sudden departure of the King from London, and the clear indications that a most cruel war was on the point of breaking out, threw all these plans into confusion, and compelled me and my friends to hasten our return.’·

While Comenius was in England, where he stayed till August 1642, he received an invitation to France. This invitation, which he did not accept, came perhaps through his correspondent Mersenne, a man of great learning, who is said to have been highly esteemed and often consulted by Descartes. It is characteristic of the state of opinion in such matters in those days, that Mersenne tells Comenius of a certain Le Maire, by whose method a boy of six years old, might, with nine months' instruction, acquire a perfect knowledge of three languages. Mersenne also had dreams of a universal alphabet, and even of a universal language.

Comenius' hopes of assistance in England being at an end, he thought of returning to Leszno, but a letter now reached him from a rich Dutch merchant, Lewis de Geer, who offered him a home and means for carrying out his plans. This Lewis de Geer, the Grand Almoner of Europe,' as Comenius calls him, displayed a princely munificence in the assistance he

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gave the exiled Protestants. At this time he was living at Nordcoping in Sweden. Comenius having now found such a patron as he was seeking, set out from England and joined him there.

Soon after the arrival of Comenius in Sweden, the great Oxenstiern sent for him to Stockholm, and with John Skyte, the Chancellor of Upsal University, examined him in several interviews about his system.

From my early youth,' said Oxenstiern, I observed something forced and incoherent in the method of instruction commonly used, but could not discover where the impediment lay. At length, being sent by my King, of glorious memory, as a legate to Germany, I held conferences there on the subject with various learned men, and when I was informed that Ratich had attempted an amendment of the method, I could not rest till I had had a personal interview with him; when, instead of favouring me with a conference, he presented me with a large quarto volume. I went through the task imposed upon me, and then perceived that he had succeeded in discovering the diseases of the schools, but the remedies he suggested seemed very insufficient. Your remedies rest upon a surer foundation.' Comenius said it was his wish to get beyond the teaching of boys to a great philosophical, or rather pansophical' work. But both Oxenstiern and Skyte urged him to confine himself, for the present, to a task less ambitious, but more practically useful. My counsel,' said Oxenstiern, is that you first satisfy the wants of the schools by rendering a knowledge of the Latin language of easier acquisition, and thereby preparing

WRITES THE 'NOVISSIMA METHODUS.'

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the path of a readier approach towards those more sublime studies.' As De Geer gave the same advice, Comenius felt himself constrained to follow it, so he agreed to settle at Elbing in Prussia, and there write a work on teaching, in which the principles of the "Didactica Magna' should be worked out with especial reference to teaching languages. Notwithstanding the remonstrances of his English friends, to which Comenius would gladly have listened, he was kept by Oxenstiern and De Geer strictly to his agreement, and thus, much against his will, he was held fast for eight years in what he calls the 'miry entanglements of logomachy.'

Elbing, where, after a journey to Leszno to fetch his family (for he had married again), Comenius now settled, is in West Prussia, 36 miles south-east of Dantzic. From 1577 to 1660, an English trading company was settled here with which the family of Hartlib is said in one account to have been connected. This perhaps was one reason why Comenius chose this town for his residence. But Hartlib, instead of assisting with money, seems at this time to have needed assistance, for in October 1642, Comenius writes to De Geer that he fears Fundanius and Hartlib are suffering from want, and that he intends for them 2001. promised by the London booksellers: he suggests that De Geer shall give them 301. each meanwhile.

The relation between Comenius and his patron naturally proved a difficult one. The Dutchman thought that as he supported Comenius, and contributed something more for the assistants, he might expect of Comenius that he would devote all his